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Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Hexagon Charm Quilt Piece-Along

Ok, here it is! My first quilt-along!

Let's make hexagon charm quilts! A charm quilt is a quilt in which no two fabrics are alike. (Read more about charm quilts here.) I'm not going to be working on a strict timeline, but we can keep each other motivated by sharing our progress and I'll offer hexagon tips and helpful links I find along the way.

The details:

I've started a flickr group for the Hexagon Charm Quilt Piece-Along. Join and start sharing your photos! It's also a place where we can organize scrap swaps and discuss our hexagon addictions.

Grab a piece-along button over there --> in the sidebar for your blog. Get someone else addicted!

I'm making a throw sized quilt with one inch hexagons. For a 50 x 60" throw, I'll need 1,173 hexagons. How many hexagons will you need to make your throw sized quilt? Check below.

I'm a designer by day, so I've made a couple of download pages that you might find helpful. Clicking on the images below will immediately begin the download from mediafire.com Google Groups. If you have trouble with the link or download, please let me know.

This is a sheet of "Easy Cut" one inch hexagons. I had been using the hexagon generator, but I found it cumbersome to cut out the nested hexagons. Using this sheet you can quickly cut your hexagons out in squares and then just snip off the corners.

If you use a paper cutter to cut out the squares first (along the dotted lines),

snipping the corners will go even faster!

The page above is for 1.5" hexagons. (Just click to download it.) With hexagons larger than 1.5", only a couple fit on a page, so it's easy to cut them out; just use the hexagon generator. With both sheets, ensure that your printer is set to print at 100% and check your scale before you cut ! You don't want to make some strange sized hexies, do you?

Haven't made hexagons yet? I complied some helpful links in this post.

Just for fun, I made some coloring pages. Print one out for the quilt you want to make and visually keep up with your progress.

Lastly, I have one other request. This is my first quilt-along, so please be gentle with me. I've checked these numbers and downloads over and over to make sure that there are no mistakes, but alas, I'm human and it's very possible I've overlooked something. If you see anything that looks strange, please let me know and I will do my best to get it corrected as soon as possible. My email address is at the top of my sidebar.

Whew! I'm tired and I haven't made a single hexagon today! I'll be back later with a little giveaway to get someone started and some hexagon basics!

thanks!! I am definitely joining this one. You inspired me to start making hexagons 3 days ago, and i am completely addicted. The only thing is, I am making a flower garden hexagon quilt. I was thinking no two flowers would be the same. Do you mind if i join anyway?

Dear Melanie,My heart id going peter patter with excitement! I am already making 3 project involving 1" hexies and wow! i had been wondering if I should be wise and save one of each colour for a charm quilt... BIG GRIN!!!I noticed your quiltalong while visiting you for BQF and well here I am, all the way from Cyprus!Can I join you?Please, say yesssss!:)

Hi! Can I join? Even though my project has started out as a millenium quilt (2000 2.5" squares from a swap) to a Grandmother's Flower Garden to being put down for years until I found this site and you guys!?

I blogged about my hexies on my blog:

www.coffeebeansdailies.blogspot.com

You can see what I have done up to now. I did not mention you yet but can always go back and edit!

Hi, I am here via Karen. I have joined her one wednesday group and was wondering if it wasn't to late to join this group. I started a hexie charm quilt several years ago and have brought it out to work on it again.

Hi, Melanie! I know I'm posting this way after the fact, but thank you so much for all of this great information. I am completely enamored with hexagons, but didn't know where to begin, and I've never really done any handsewing. I'm going to take the leap, all thanks to you!

Melanie-Thank you so much for posting this information. I've been seeing all these little hexies everywhere, and I've been VERY jealous! I can't wait to start on mine when I get home tonight. Finally, a use for all those charm packs I've been saving!

Hi MelanieI have just discovered your group and i hope that i am not too late to join you.I am working on a Grandmothers Flower Garden at the moment,but can't resist working with this as well,Hope you will say yes and let me feed my addiction please!

I'm so excited to find this post! I've been teetering on the idea of making a hexie quilt. I love to do hand piecing, expecially while I watch tv. I was nervous though about cutting my own templates. Now I have found this template pattern, and your blog. I feel that perhaps I can do this afterall. I am wondering if you printed yours and cut them out of regular paper, or something stronger? I am planning to do mine of cardstock paper in my printer. With a deep breath...

I'm working on a 2" hexagon charm quilt. I started it about 2 months ago and have about 5 years to go! I do try to work on it every day, but it'll take time to finish it. It's beautiful. Thanks for the graph paper for coloring. Next time, I'll do that first.

Love the downloads. I am working on my first hexagon quilt and love it. It wont be my first one. I am self taught and I have learned so much from the Quilting Board and downloads and blogs like yours. Thanks.

In case anyone likes help with the hexagon, Creative Memories have 2 punches with 2 different sizes on them that work with material. I got the hint on the board, I bought the large on ebay. I cut the paper with the smaller hexagon and then cut the bigger hexagon with the material. Works great, and got a great price on Ebay.

Best hex template yet. I've been trying not to get caught up in hex's yet, but I've just cut out 100 templates. Because they all line up, I found it is easier to cut the horizontal, then instead of cutting squares, cut straight along the diagonal next making each strip into 2 diamonds and 2 odd shapes, then it is easy to cut around the rest. I production lined it and just cut out 5 sheets very quickly.

I was inspired to start a hexagon quilt from your site. I printed off your 1 inch hexagon colouring sheet before, but now the link no longer works. Is the sheet still available? plett(at)stvital(dot)com

I just found your wonderful set of posts as I plan to make a hexagon quilt of my own.

Can you tell me how you figured out how many hexagons you'll be needing? In typically individual fashion, I want to do 1.25" hexagons, which you don't have on your list. My maths doesn't feel up to trying to figure out the formula myself right now.